Yes, I have, @Gee D . I spent a lot of time trying to work out how I could avoid troubling my daughter in the way my mother The Dowager troubled me - hence my cupboards are immaculate and Decluttering has taken place, among other things.
Now all I can do is hope that I respect my daughter enough then, as I do now, to believe she would only mean the best for me.
But then, that is all predicated on my not getting dementia
@Gee D yes indeed. I will reach the allotted span in June, and have been the oldest in our family for almost a decade. My recent health issues have only brought that into sharper focus. I am hoping that I am given the years to at least see our eight grandchildren into adolescence. If so, I will be the longest-lived male in our direct line.
Thank you all. We're a bit older than at least 2 of you and are wondering quite how things will pan out. At this stage, Dlet has not announced any plans for the future of his relationship; he knows that for what it's worth, we both like his companion and would rejoice were they married. Given that we're now entering our mid-70s, our chances of seeing adult grandchildren aren't on the high side (our parents all lived well into their 90s but who knows?) although we'd rather like to. We're still healthy but what will happen tomorrow?
I wonder if it goes in cycles, so that one generation is the Worst Ever, the next generation resolves to be the opposite, and then the third (having no direct experience of the Worst) repeats all the old mistakes.
At last Big Brother Zappa has recognized the signs of serious decline that Big Sister Zappa and I have been seen for a few declining years. She failed to summon her Hostess Syndrome abilities when he was there, earlier this week. Just a few clues like missed Doctors' appointments, strange stories about shopping trips that happened months or years ago, confusion as to whether hospital visits had occurred, days of the week, meals and medications taken.
(((Zappa and Big Sister)))
My dad is starting to get in the paranoid stage of his Alzheimer's. He thinks his finances are being kept from him, and led Sister Useless to wonder if I was absconding with his funds. Oh, I was so angry. Dad has a record of their bank statements and a summary that I put together. So, Sister U now knows exactly where that is and can tell Dad where to look for it. She actually talked nicer to me today. (No, I don't trust that!!!)
D-U and I hired a person who does estate sales to take care of selling Mom and Dad's house contents. So, that's a load off my mind. I'm still putting my house together after the renovations. One of my handymen also hauls away any unwanted things that will be left in the house, so all that remains is cleaning it and putting it up for sale!
Dad wants to go back to the house to get anything that he might want to have, so I will do that on Monday. We did do that before he and Mom moved into Assisted Living, but he doesn't remember that. D-U and I are considering letting Mom look, too. She is right now the happiest I remember her ever being. We don't want to upset her by taking her to the house, but she will forget she was even there by the time she gets back to her apartment. Otherwise, one of us would have to stay with her while Dad goes, because she gets frightened when Dad isn't with her. Oh well, we have a few days to weigh things.
Another overnighter in hospital for AP Zappa, who fell getting out of bed yesterday. Skin tears, bruising and another head knock. To be sent home today.
The hospice physio visited today. Mum was fretting yesterday about Dad looking smart for the visit - she said that she thought the physio would think them "disrespectful" if Dad wasn't smartly dressed.
The physio has agreed that Dad is still managing the stairs well. This is not what my brother and I think - we are very keen to have his bed moved downstairs, though I appreciate Dad doesn't want that because it will feel like the beginning of the end.
Also my mother seems to think that if they start getting carers in to help Dad with showering, this will add to her workload. I'm not sure why she thinks this, unless she thinks that things will not only have to be clean, but that she'll have to wipe everything down with the anti-bac before and after. At the moment she cleans the shower after Dad has used it, but she seems to think this won't enough if there are carers involved.
That sounds to me like anxiety on your mother's part - or martyr complex. I'm sorry, that's harsh, but I do know whereof I speak, having parents who are both given to that sort of thing in their different ways.
She was sent home after two nights - my sister has tried to implement stricter care procedures around AP's home care (and around her hospital "expulsions" - last time she was simply stuck in a taxi and sent home to an empty house).
I chatted with her (AP Zappa not Sister Zappa) yesterday and she was very confused about days, off-spring, even the time of year but that, hopefully will settle in the next few days. 🕯
Has anyone thought that so many of us are by now ourselves aging parents?
We are in the over 70 group for the Covid vaccine. We have two sons in their 30s, one in Japan and one following tunneling work around Australia (and overseas when that becomes possible again). LKKspouse remarks how it is usually daughters that look after APs, and we have none. We don't need any support yet (and are still looking at giving our sons support), but there are signs that one day we will.
Yes, We're booked in for our covid shots tomorrow, assuming they'll be available. Dlet is doing well in getting his career established, but he's just as slow as we were in getting married.
My father's bed was moved downstairs yesterday. My brother and nephew cleared out the dining room and set it up as his bedroom. Dad can still cope with stairs (I watched him go up on Saturday) but Mum has a dodgy hip and as he is spending longer in bed she needs to be able to bring him cups of tea etc without negotiating the stairs.
Dad is not happy about this move downstairs. Mum was crying, says she feels "guilty" about having a bad hip at age 87. "It's all my fault your Dad has had to come downstairs" etc etc.
We felt the dining room was ideal as it has glass paneled connecting doors with the living room, so Mum would be able to keep an eye on Dad when he's asleep without feeling the need to keep going into his room to check on him.
My brother and I were massively relieved as we have been worried about Mum falling on the stairs. Our relief was short-lived. When I phoned last night Mum said that she felt she couldn't sit in the living room in the evenings any more, in case the light from the livingroom affected Dad's sleep in the dining room (see above re connecting glass-paneled doors). And so she was spending the evening in the kitchen, sitting on a hard wooden kitchen chair, and going through to his room to check on him.
My brother is going round today to measure up for door curtains.
I appreciate having this thread to vent sooooo much. The only thing that could improve this thread would be the return of the head-banging emoji.
The thread also makes me appreciate my brother and sister-in-law who also have my sister-in-law's Aged Parent to assist.
It's cold comfort, but at least your mum is talking to you about her problems, @North East Quine . When Mother-in-law was taking care of my father-in-law in his last illness it was very difficult to get her to tell us how things really were - she didn't like to make a fuss and would only ask for help when it really became impossible for her to manage alone.
My father goes home on Thursday. He had two cardiac arrests over a month ago and has been convalescing at my sister's place, 5 minutes down the road from his house. During his absence, there have been several renovations to his house designed to accommodate his new limitations.
Well it doesn't end when the AP dies. The will has to be sorted before April 30. His bank account does not have sufficient funds to pay the taxes by that date: "capital gains". Lawyer and accountant both. Things must now be organized to take life insurance that's directed to pay others so as to pay the tax owing. Not a trivial amount. Not simple.
Another thing. Why did he save the teeth he'd had extracted? I guess they go with the ashes? My evil sister said we could make a necklace or earrings. May I say, do not look this up on the internet. There's a nightmarish rabbit hole of preserved bits of people out there. Yes it is worse than preserved saints under glass in various churches.
I recollect in a John Buchan novel set in the 18thC a Minister character salvaging a tooth to be buried with him - to save God the trouble of finding all the bits at the resurrection.
Oh dear! John Donne had a poem based on a bracelet of hair, worn to ensure a quick meet-up on the Last Day:
A bracelet of bright hair about the bone...
Will [a gravedigger of the future]
think that there a loving couple lies,
Who thought that this device might be some way
To make their souls, at the last busy day,
Meet at this grave, and make a little stay?
My brother and I had to put our 96-year-old mother in assisted living this week. A year ago our other brother who had been staying with her died at the end of March. She still had a dog that kept her company and got her moving in during the day. But he died in February.
Mom has been getting very forgetful. Other than eating at the Senior Center twice a week and getting one meal on wheels midweek, she does not prepare any food. She has had congestive heart failure for years.
Last week I went down to visit her--she is seven hours away. The purpose was to tell her she needed to go into an assisted living program. She was very resistant. She initially said she would not. But eventually, she said she wanted to stay in the town where she lives--though she initially did not want to live there over 60 years ago.
I left her place on Monday. Tuesday she did not call my brother like she was supposed to, so he rushed over and found her in bed. Her O2 level had dropped and she was saying her heart felt like it was going to jump out of her chest. They got her to the hospital. Tests showed she had a lot of fluid in her heart cavity. Once they got her on oxygen, though, she stabilized.
She was taken off oxygen on Friday and was holding her own until Sunday morning. When they had to put her back on 02 again.
I got a real, if foolish on my part, shock when my dad referred to himself as nearly 79 year old man. He is, of course, but there's still part of me that thinks of this as grandparent age. It also underlines the fact that I and we will go through what others are describing here.
I've just come back from visiting my oldest brother who has Parkinsons. I went into his room looking for him and it stank to high heaven - like a urinal. I know he has little or no sense of smell, but I wondered how hygienic it was. I wanted to spend time with him and had come close to lunchtime so I didn't seek out a staff member.
I think I will visit the local Age Concern branch to discuss this. I know I probably should have done something at the time, but I had been bowled over by some other bad news and I probably would only have burst into tears. It's difficult to sound like an objective adult when you are bawling your eyes out.
The other thing that upset me was that he was sitting in his wheelchair in the middle of a fundamentalist religious meeting. Earlier in his stay there he had made it quite clear he was not at all religious. It is so unfair that he just goes where they park his wheel chair. I felt like asking if they were that desperate for converts or did no longer being able to express himself clearly mean he was a suitable convert?
I am so angry he has this horrible condition, he's not yet 70 and started his life with a condition that probably predisposed him Parkinsons, it just seems so bloody unfair. And yes, I do know that life isn't meant to be fair.
Comments
Now all I can do is hope that I respect my daughter enough then, as I do now, to believe she would only mean the best for me.
But then, that is all predicated on my not getting dementia
Nothing serious of course.
But it's a start I guess.
My dad is starting to get in the paranoid stage of his Alzheimer's. He thinks his finances are being kept from him, and led Sister Useless to wonder if I was absconding with his funds. Oh, I was so angry. Dad has a record of their bank statements and a summary that I put together. So, Sister U now knows exactly where that is and can tell Dad where to look for it. She actually talked nicer to me today. (No, I don't trust that!!!)
D-U and I hired a person who does estate sales to take care of selling Mom and Dad's house contents. So, that's a load off my mind. I'm still putting my house together after the renovations. One of my handymen also hauls away any unwanted things that will be left in the house, so all that remains is cleaning it and putting it up for sale!
Dad wants to go back to the house to get anything that he might want to have, so I will do that on Monday. We did do that before he and Mom moved into Assisted Living, but he doesn't remember that. D-U and I are considering letting Mom look, too. She is right now the happiest I remember her ever being. We don't want to upset her by taking her to the house, but she will forget she was even there by the time she gets back to her apartment. Otherwise, one of us would have to stay with her while Dad goes, because she gets frightened when Dad isn't with her. Oh well, we have a few days to weigh things.
The hospice physio visited today. Mum was fretting yesterday about Dad looking smart for the visit - she said that she thought the physio would think them "disrespectful" if Dad wasn't smartly dressed.
The physio has agreed that Dad is still managing the stairs well. This is not what my brother and I think - we are very keen to have his bed moved downstairs, though I appreciate Dad doesn't want that because it will feel like the beginning of the end.
Also my mother seems to think that if they start getting carers in to help Dad with showering, this will add to her workload. I'm not sure why she thinks this, unless she thinks that things will not only have to be clean, but that she'll have to wipe everything down with the anti-bac before and after. At the moment she cleans the shower after Dad has used it, but she seems to think this won't enough if there are carers involved.
She was sent home after two nights - my sister has tried to implement stricter care procedures around AP's home care (and around her hospital "expulsions" - last time she was simply stuck in a taxi and sent home to an empty house).
I chatted with her (AP Zappa not Sister Zappa) yesterday and she was very confused about days, off-spring, even the time of year but that, hopefully will settle in the next few days. 🕯
Dad is not happy about this move downstairs. Mum was crying, says she feels "guilty" about having a bad hip at age 87. "It's all my fault your Dad has had to come downstairs" etc etc.
We felt the dining room was ideal as it has glass paneled connecting doors with the living room, so Mum would be able to keep an eye on Dad when he's asleep without feeling the need to keep going into his room to check on him.
My brother and I were massively relieved as we have been worried about Mum falling on the stairs. Our relief was short-lived. When I phoned last night Mum said that she felt she couldn't sit in the living room in the evenings any more, in case the light from the livingroom affected Dad's sleep in the dining room (see above re connecting glass-paneled doors). And so she was spending the evening in the kitchen, sitting on a hard wooden kitchen chair, and going through to his room to check on him.
My brother is going round today to measure up for door curtains.
I appreciate having this thread to vent sooooo much. The only thing that could improve this thread would be the return of the head-banging emoji.
The thread also makes me appreciate my brother and sister-in-law who also have my sister-in-law's Aged Parent to assist.
Doone is right; this is a safe place for a rant, as I well know!
Another thing. Why did he save the teeth he'd had extracted? I guess they go with the ashes? My evil sister said we could make a necklace or earrings. May I say, do not look this up on the internet. There's a nightmarish rabbit hole of preserved bits of people out there. Yes it is worse than preserved saints under glass in various churches.
A bracelet of bright hair about the bone...
Will [a gravedigger of the future]
think that there a loving couple lies,
Who thought that this device might be some way
To make their souls, at the last busy day,
Meet at this grave, and make a little stay?
Mom has been getting very forgetful. Other than eating at the Senior Center twice a week and getting one meal on wheels midweek, she does not prepare any food. She has had congestive heart failure for years.
Last week I went down to visit her--she is seven hours away. The purpose was to tell her she needed to go into an assisted living program. She was very resistant. She initially said she would not. But eventually, she said she wanted to stay in the town where she lives--though she initially did not want to live there over 60 years ago.
I left her place on Monday. Tuesday she did not call my brother like she was supposed to, so he rushed over and found her in bed. Her O2 level had dropped and she was saying her heart felt like it was going to jump out of her chest. They got her to the hospital. Tests showed she had a lot of fluid in her heart cavity. Once they got her on oxygen, though, she stabilized.
She was taken off oxygen on Friday and was holding her own until Sunday morning. When they had to put her back on 02 again.
Has not been a good week.
Prayers, upholding, etc. for the journey
Gramps49
Lamb Chopped - Donne gets things so right, doesn't he.
I think I will visit the local Age Concern branch to discuss this. I know I probably should have done something at the time, but I had been bowled over by some other bad news and I probably would only have burst into tears. It's difficult to sound like an objective adult when you are bawling your eyes out.
The other thing that upset me was that he was sitting in his wheelchair in the middle of a fundamentalist religious meeting. Earlier in his stay there he had made it quite clear he was not at all religious. It is so unfair that he just goes where they park his wheel chair. I felt like asking if they were that desperate for converts or did no longer being able to express himself clearly mean he was a suitable convert?
I am so angry he has this horrible condition, he's not yet 70 and started his life with a condition that probably predisposed him Parkinsons, it just seems so bloody unfair. And yes, I do know that life isn't meant to be fair.